I'm not buying her term -- having seen Piniella pad about his ballpark office in stubble, sweat, shorts and cigarette smoke, my use of "sexy" is severely constrained.

But there is something compelling about Louis Victor Piniella. It has nothing to do with gender, and everything to do with an emotional gravity that pulls many in his midst to him.

It is powerful.

It is gone.

It is too bad for Seattle sports. There has never been anything like it here.

After reading yesterday's sports headlines, the Spousal Unit put it this way:

"It's the end," Julia said, voice catching, "of the cult of Lou."

The cult of Lou is something of which I've been dimly aware, but didn't consider seriously until its absence was dawning.

Guys aren't supposed to give such things much credence. We're supposed to talk about the virtues of batting Boone third instead of fifth, of bringing in the lefty reliever despite the right- handed pinch-hitters on the other bench, and whether to position the first baseman in the ninth to guard the line. What will Lou do?

As a sports columnist, today I'm supposed to write about the hows and whys of his abrupt departure, and who might succeed him. All worthy topics, all to be covered endlessly in coming days.

But at the moment, the cult of Lou is over in Seattle.

For Mariners fans, it's a hard good-bye. It's worth a different sort of farewell.

The injuries, the lidded payroll, the strike threat, the late-season collapse, the potential departures of Edgar Martinez, Dan Wilson, Jamie Moyer and John Olerud -- a compromised season had grown agonizing. On top of that was the prospect that the Anaheim Angels, who provided the chins upon which the Mariners struck matches for victory cigars the past seven years, are a dead-solid shot to win the World Series.

Now, after 10 years of helping transform a team that had more losses than any team in baseball in the 1980s and 1990s combined, the man who created instant baseball credibility in the Northwest just by showing up, is walking away.

As is always the case in team sports -- with the possible exception of Babe Ruth's departure from the Red Sox to the Yankees -- no individual transcends the whole. The Mariners, Huskies and Sonics all recovered from the previous departure of icons to win titles. Presumably, the Mariners will again.

But with Piniella, there was an important distinction that separated his contribution from all others in my three decades around Seattle sports.

Again, I defer to wiser counsel.

"Lou," said Julia, "let us inside."

Whether by tirade or treatise, Piniella let his unashamed passion open a door for major league baseball to a region that for 15 years made minimal compact with the game.

Its own self-delusions notwithstanding, baseball in America can be an insular activity, with all its Byzantine rules, inexplicable customs and long, ritualized history that almost defies absorption by those unfamiliar with it.

What Piniella did was allow the uninitiated to wonder: What is it about this often boring game and chaotic industry that makes a rational, successful grandfather care enough to cuss, kick his hat and throw dirt in view of God, country and all the ships at sea? And why does everyone love him for it?

The foundation of the devotion to Piniella, by players and fans alike, is a competitive heart that is as relentless as it is open. Question or disagree with his baseball strategies all one wants, it was impossible to dispute that his agenda was to win -- big, hard and often.

To the absolute dumbstruck disbelief of the rest of baseball, he did it in Seattle. And in a way that transformed the sports culture of a town where football was king.

Besides the obvious field success, Piniella's passion, surrounded by an amiable collection of baseball personalities and talent, made the Mariners of the past 10 years accessible and endearing for fans either new or previously lost to the game.

In frequent surveys of fans, Mariners executives have shared a not-so-secret observation that explains an unusual part of why Seattle has led the major leagues in attendance the past two seasons: The club has more female fans than perhaps any other baseball team.

Books could be written on the topic, but it says here that a significant, if immeasurable, part of the club's appeal is Piniella's bad-boy strength and vulnerability, and his unapologetic defense of those in his charge.

One does not need to know the difference between a cutter and a curve to appreciate a caring that goes soul deep.

That doesn't mean that women can't appreciate a well-timed hit-and-run, nor that men are oblivious to Piniella's deeper connections.

It just means that while fans may not have known what he was thinking -- hey, even his players, coaches and bosses sometimes didn't know that, last week being another example -- it didn't matter as much, because everyone felt they knew him, and knew exactly how he felt.

How often can that be said about others in our lives?

Such emotional power in no way discounts a baseball savvy that often surprises even longtime vets.

"There are days he can't spit something out," retired outfielder Jay Buhner said in a recent conversation. "There are days he calls people by the wrong names. Some days you perceive him and say, 'What the hell is going on?'

"That's what's so beautiful about Lou. I'm telling you, he doesn't miss a beat. He's very smart. He knows what's going on at all times.

"Hiring him here was the greatest thing in the world."

In what was his final weekend in a Mariners uniform, Piniella found himself out of uniform on a Friday night at Edison Field in Anaheim, suspended by the commissioner's office for a game after his notorious Sept. 18 base-throwing episode that allegedly included an inadvertent bump of the umpire.

He spent most of the game in the press box, where I sat next to him for a few innings. We talked a little on the record, but mostly we just talked.

He could have said something about his intentions to leave, but absent a pitcher of margaritas, Piniella betrayed no clues. He talked about trying rookie Willie Bloomquist at third base next spring, wondered if relief pitcher Doug Creek would kill John McLaren's unbeaten mark as substitute manager, admired what the Angels had done this season.

In the 11th inning, Mariners reliever John Halama picked off an Angels runner, only to be denied by a bad call from the first-base umpire, as TV replays established.

Piniella erupted.

I flinched.

"You stink!" he bellowed from the second row, rising from his chair. Heads turned in the first row, and upon seeing the violator of the press-box code of no cheering or booing, all the heads had smiles.

"You got one damn base to watch!" he complained of the umpire. As play continued and he settled back into his chair, he mumbled some more about the grand injustices of the arbiters.

The play was meaningless in a meaningless game, the pennant race having ended a day earlier. Piniella had no team around him to inspire, no umpire close enough to intimidate. He didn't need to impress anyone in the press box -- he'd been long over that.

In the waning days of the cult of Lou in Seattle, it was simply Piniella being his unavoidable, irrepressible, incorrigible and admirably honest self.

On a sad day, the story is oddly satisfying. As with millions of Mariners fans on many other occasions over the past 10 years, as well as his fans in New York, Cincinnati and throughout baseball, I was again allowed the privilege of being inside.